videotape recorder

The Portapak was a video camera with the first battery-operated, portable videotape recorder.

“When we were kids, we used to make videos with our neighbors – I think we recreated the show Friends at one point – but this was on an old videotape recorder, and I don’t even think my parents watched them.”

Video recording technology itself dates to the early 1920s, but the company Ampex is credited with developing the first commercially viable videotape recorder in 1956.

In 1956, Ampex Electric and Manufacturing Company introduced what its website calls “the first practical videotape recorder.”

The radio's success led to more firsts in transistorized products, such as an 8-in. television and a videotape recorder.